Cognovo modem tape-out sent to Samsung

LONDON – Cognovo Ltd., a 2009 startup focused on developing software-defined modems (SDMs) for 4G communications, has sent the tape-out of the latest version of its modem compute engine off to Samsung Foundry for manufacture on a 45-nm low power manufacturing process.

The device is based on a core called the MCE160 and will enable licensees to develop software modems for all cellular wireless communications standards including WiFi, 2G, 3G, HSPA+, LTE and LTE advanced, Cognovo said. The MCE160 core includes an ARM Cortex processor and a vector signal processor together with local memory and interconnection peripherals.

The MCE160 includes additional resources compared with the MCE120 and essentially provides the headroom to allow Cognovo's platform to address LTE-advanced.

Cognovo (Melbourn, England) said samples will be available to lead customers later this year. However, Cognovo's primary business model is the licensing of intellectual property. The chips running at Samsung are intended to provide customers with proof of concept and to populate system development boards to be delivered as part of core licensing deal.

The MCE160 makes use of vector signal processing technology acquired from ARM in 2009 and delivers up to 250-Gops (giga operations per second), the company said. This performance is suitable to allow user equipment to run modems in software for multiple wireless standards.